MICHAEL POPE AND GAS TAKE OVER SOUTH ALABAMA

It had been awhile since the Georgia Asphalt Series had been in action and when they got back to it this weekend, ironically enough they weren’t on Georgia asphalt; they were on the South Alabama kind. Sixteen-year-old Georgian Michael Pope didn’t mind the location so much, as he brought home his first top-five finish in the GAS series

“It was a really good weekend. We ran at South Alabama Speedway this weekend and that’s in Opp, Alabama,” said Pope. “We had practice on Friday, and the first time we went out to practice we were really, really good and we were on about 50-lap tires.

“So we came back in to let the car and the tires cool off and we weren’t as good as we were. We put on a new set of tires on Saturday morning and then went out there and turned some really good laps. The tires at Opp fall off about a second within 50 laps. I have never run Pensacola, but everyone tells me that it is a little rougher than what Pensacola is.”

On Saturday, 34 cars attempted to make the field; Pope was able to qualify for the 11th starting position. While ten spots wouldn’t be too hard to try and make up in 100 laps of racing, racing incidents involving other competitors made Pope’s top-five run a little hard to achieve.

“We qualified 11th. During the race we were running consistently and we got passed on about lap six and then right after that the caution came out. We got going again and I think I was running twelfth and then the next caution a bunch of cars in front of me got on their brakes really hard and they spun, and I spun to miss them. So I had to go to the back of the pack and we had to try and save our tires, but still work our way up through the field. We had to pass 24 cars to get back up to fourth position and that was a lot of cars. The car was really hooked up.”

Pope was able to bring the car home to a fourth-place finish, his best result of the season and also his career-best finish in the GAS.

“It was such a great weekend. It was my first time ever going there, and I really love the racetrack; I just wish that it didn’t chew up tires so much.”

“This is our best career finish in the GAS and it is just really exciting. I have so many people I want to thank. I want to say a special thank you to Frankie Grill and his racecars. We just got our motor rebuilt by Volunteer Performance in Tennessee and we got a new body put on the car. I really have to tell my parents and my crew thank you, because we put in hours until 1am out here for a week trying to get the car ready again. It was our first race with the new car again.”